rouble will befall us. But let us
talk no more of such matters, since we cannot mend them. Where is your
citole, Nigel? Will you not play and sing to me?"

The gentleman of those days could scarce read and write; but he spoke
in two languages, played at least one musical instrument as a matter of
course, and possessed a number of other accomplishments, from the imping
of hawk's feathers, to the mystery of venery, with knowledge of every
beast and bird, its time of grace and when it was seasonable. As far as
physical feats went, to vault barebacked upon a horse, to hit a running
hare with a crossbow-bolt, or to climb the angle of a castle courtyard,
were feats which had come by nature to the young Squire; but it was very
different with music, which had called for many a weary hour of irksome
work. Now at last he could master the strings, but both his ear and his
voice were not of the best, so that it was well perhaps that there was
so small and so unprejudiced an audience to the Norman-French chanson,
which he sang in a high reedy voice with great earnestness of feeling,
but with many a slip and quaver, waving his yellow head in cadence to
the music:

A sword! A sword! Ah, give me a sword!
For the world is all to win.
Though the way be hard and the door be barred,
The strong man enters in.
If Chance and Fate still hold the gate,
Give me the iron key,
And turret high my plume shall fly,
Or you may weep for me!

A horse! A horse! Ah, give me a horse!
To bear me out afar,
Where blackest need and grimmest deed
And sweetest perils are.
Hold thou my ways from glutted days
Where poisoned leisure lies,
And point the path of tears and wrath
Which mounts to high emprise!

A heart! A heart! Ah, give me a heart
To rise to circumstance!
Serene and high and bold to try
The hazard of the chance,
With strength to wait, but fixed as fate
To plan and dare and do,
The peer of all, and only thrall,
Sweet lady mine, to you!

It may have been that the sentiment went for more than the music, or it
may have been the nicety of her own ears had been dulled by age, but old
Dame Ermyntrude clapped her lean hands together and cried out in shrill
applause.

"Weathercote has indeed had an ap